I found out yesterday, when I logged into my work computer that I am scheduled for another week of training. Yippee!! I need to find my lunch tote again, put gas in my car, and do some laundry. I will be working Monday thru Friday, giving me a weekend off. 

I am hoping that next week I will get to the sewing machine. I miss sewing. I did a bit this week for Elly and I have a bit more to do to finish up her stuff. Then I will make something pretty for me. 

 

I still need to get out and weed the flower bed. It is starting to look unkempt. My list seems to grow every day and I never seem to make any progress. Oh well, that is life and I need to deal with it. 

Time for bed, 
Judy

 

 I have been playing with the project mentioned in the previous post. I have found a fabric from my stash that will work for the border. I have decided to take off the last row that I just put on. It will now be square. I think I like it. I am ready to get to the hand quilting part.

I moved a chest of drawers from my basement to my hallway. I want a place to put my wall hanging and table runners. It also needs a topper. Another project, just what I need.  The chest is old. It was the chest my mom and dad got to put my stuff in when I was born. I had no idea when I put it under my basement stairs that there was stuff in the drawers. It was like Christmas!! I found that extra container of buttons. I had been looking for those for almost a year.





In stitches,
Judy

Catching up!

    

Elly and her mom have gone home and I am sad. It was such a joy to have both of them here for a visit. I am grateful for all the help my sister, Patty, gave me in order to get the house in order and for the loan of the baby stuff. I am gearing up for the next visit the end of September. 

I have been sewing for Elly the last few days. I have several outfits cut of for summer and summer is waning. Soon it will time to get started on the fall and winter wardrobe.

Things have changed at work and there is very little down time, so the hexies have gone to  live in the dining room/sewing room. I am hoping to get them out to play with soon. 

My August project with my sister, Karen, is going to be finishing Elly's summer things and that project . I have been trying to finish it up for almost a year. It is hand pieced and it will be hand quilted and then it will be done and ready to be hung in the living room. It is made with muted colors that remind me of fall. 

In stitches,
Judy

Happy Times!!

These are pictures from Elly's house and helping with the packing.

 Tania and Elly arrived safely on Saturday afternoon after spending time with my sister, Becky and a trip to Graeter's  for ice cream. Everyone had a good time. Once she got here they left to go and see her great grandfather. Elly was a hit and now that she is crawling, she entertained everyone. 

Today we went to a local county park for a picnic. It was a bring your own picnic and lots of sharing. All of my siblings except for my sister, Karen were in attendance.

We had a quiet evening in the front yard on a blanket, alternating between sitting and playing with Gramma's key and standing up. Not much on napping so hoping for a long sleep tonight.

In stitches,
Judy

Today is the day!!

All the cleaning and shopping is done! Now I am counting down the hours until Tania and Elly will be here for their visit. We have a few things planned to do while they are here but mostly it will be just hanging out a Gramma's house.

 This is what I look like in the morning. Slightly dazed and confused!

In stitches,
Judy

Excitement is Building!

Counting down the days!! Saturday cannot come soon enough. These two cuties are coming for a visit. It is a shame that my son is unable to join them, but I understand. There is still a bit of work that needs to be done around here before Saturday. My sister, Patty, is coming tomorrow to help with the cleaning and decluttering. The last couple of weeks have been killer at work. For the moment, the training is done. But you never know when that can change. 
 
This afternoon my mom and my sister, Becky went to see the play Big River at the Showboat Majestic it was a very good production. It was a gorgeous day and there was a lot of traffic on the river and it took some getting used to the swaying of the boat. Cincinnati has a lot to offer and it is nice to check out things in your own backyard. 

There has not been much time to do any quilting and I miss it!! So I have been spending my winding down time checking out quilt blogs and adding to my quilt bucket list. I did pull out that one project that has almost been finished for quite some time. here. I cannot find the yellow fabric for the border so I have going to pull something else out of my stash and use that. I am hoping that this will be my August project and I can start the hand quilting and finish it once and for all!

In stitches,
Judy

 



 

Busy, busy

I would like to say that I have been busy sewing and quilting, but that would be lie. Training has been kicking my butt. I normally work second shift and that is fine with me but for training I had to work day shift. And I had to be in the office, wear nice clothes, and pack a lunch. I seem to get more done in the morning and not so much in the evening. Today will be interesting. I am home and working my regular shift but I have to be in the office for another day of training and a day shift. 

I did spent about 20 minutes yesterday working on my hexies. That made me happy and calmed me down before starting my shift. I also made chili for dinner last night and it was awesome! Of course, I do not use a recipe and I will not be able to duplicate it again.

This is my squirrel friend who visits my porch while I am working. The first time he did this I thought he had died on my porch. No, he just like laying on my porch and eat the seed I put out!!

In stitches,
Judy

 

Stuff

It has been a wild week already and it is only Tuesday! I have training and I have to be in the office the rest of the week and again on Monday. And it is a daytime shift. It is a big change for me. I am trying to figure out how to get everything done in the evening that I normally do in the morning. It is not working. I was hoping to get some overtime in this week, too. Offering cash incentives for overtime besides time and a half. 

This is also putting a crimp in my sewing time. I did get a tiny bit of GFG hexie sewing done last night at my sister's concert. 

But it was more fun watching, my nephew, Neil eat ice cream! He certainly seems to enjoy it. He refused to use the spoon and kept biting the Styrofoam cup to get to the ice cream. 

In stitches,
Judy

Making progress

I have been steadily adding hexies to my GFG and I am making progress in baby steps. I started this over 15 years ago and without much direction. It never dawned on me to sew in rows. I seemed to sew t in a more circular direction. Now it is long enough from the head board to the foot board but the sides look more amoeba-like. It appears the top right hand corner is missing!

  I have a stack of flowers, several stacks of the white hexies for spacers and a bunch of  hexies that need to become flowers.  

I have also learned a lot along the way. Some of the fabrics I have used in the GFG are of questionable origin. But it is too late to take them out. I also notice there are quite a few selvages in the seams of my flowers. A no no now, but again something I did not know before. I also realized that I am a bright print kind of gal. Not many bright prints in the GFG. I am lucky that I still a bunch of the less than bright prints in my stash, so if I need to cut more hexies for flowers, I will be in business. 

Still need to get out and finish the mulch in my yard. It was quite warm and very humid today, so I took a nap after doing my errands. I may get out tonight as the sun goes down and then again first thing in the morning. My work schedule is changing this week. I will be going into the office for training during the day, quite a change from my work at home second shift. Got to find my lunch tote and start packing my lunch and snacks. It is so handy to walk into the kitchen for lunches and snacks! 

Linking up to  Sewing by Moonlight. At the Plum and June Let's Get Acquainted link up!

In stitches,
Judy

Babysitting

 

 
I just spoke with my daughter in law and it is a go. She has to be in Cincinnati for meetings in August. She will be here for the weekend and then the meetings. She will be staying with me and bringing Elly!!
I am so excited! I have not seen them since Easter.

In stitches,
Judy

Yard work

Monday was yard work day at my house. My mom came down to help along with my sister and her three kids. This is part of the barter we decided on. I made a quilt for my sister to give to a co worker and I got yard work in return. We got a lot done, but there is still more to do. It is the middle of July and my mulch is still in bags on my driveway. I did put some mulch down yesterday, but I am not in the mood to do it today.

I did get some work done on my hexies yesterday. We were having system issues yesterday. We are moving a big chunk of our business to the new system and I was unable to log in at yesterday for work. I sat there for 8 hours trying to entertain myself. So I did get hexie time. I understand that things are jumping at work today and I have already logged in, so I am ready to start in a few hours. But I will have my hexies handy for any down time that  comes my way!!

In stitches,
Judy

Progress

I have been working steadily on my old hexie project and I would like to think I am making progress. Not really. It took a while for it to get misshapen and it will take some time to put it back in order.

 My sister, Karen and I are doing one project each month. She had decided for Christmas in July. She is busily stitching on a Christmas Redwork Santa. I am busily thinking of a project to do. I was hoping to have pin basted my Christmas quilt and I could be hand quilting on it. But that has not happened. I have a Lil' Twister project that I want to start. It is too early think about Elly's Christmas dress. It is still early for me to have a project nailed down, so I am good!!

Time to get busy. I have a few projects to complete before it is time for work. Have a great weekend and sew!!

In stitches,
Judy

With time to spare

The birthday party/4th of July celebration is in less than 24 hours from now and Neil's quilt is done. It has been washed and fluffed and it is still a tiny bit damp. It is hanging over the shower rod in the bathroom and will be ready for wrapping in the morning.

The breakfast picnic and stroll around the part of the lake was very nice. We left the park just as it was starting to get hot and sticky. Now the only thing left for me to do today besides working is to make potato salad. I will start that tonight.  I did pull a few weeds and they were so easy to do because we have had quite a bit of rain. Hoping to get back to the weeding after our picnic  tomorrow.

Linking up with Friday Finishes.

In stitches,
Judy

Updates

 

The quilt for my nephew is completely snipped and tomorrow it will get it's wash and fluff. I have been working on my GFG quilt. I have added several hexies to the project but it is going to be a long slow project.

The yard work is coming along nicely. We have gotten a bunch of rain and it is a good and bad thing, I am saving time and money by not watering and it makes weeding easier, but it is so wet outside that it makes weeding a bit treacherous.

Tomorrow is a breakfast picnic and hike and a trip to the the laundromat and I need to make potato salad for our 4th of July picnic/birthday party. It is early in the day and I should be able to get home in time for some weeding. I still have mulch to put down. Working seems to get in the way!!

My sister and I have decided that our July projects should be Christmas related. I had great hopes of having my Christmas quilt pin basted in order to start hand quilting. Not!! I guess I will work on the Lil' Twister wall hanging. And there is always more of Elly's summer wardrobe. So very busy, so little time.

Need to get back upstairs to prepare for work. I need to fill the bird feeder and add some bird seed to the porch for the squirrels and cardinals. I need to get the hummingbird filler hung up and filled.

In stitches,
Judy

Hexies Rule!

  I have dug out my Grandmother's Flower Garden quilt out of the closet with the intention of finishing the piecing of the top by the end of 2013. It is still misshapen but I have slowly added pieces to it. I keep it clothe pinned to the trash bag at my desk and I work on it whenever I have a free minute. It is my oldest UFO. Linking up with Judy L.

I was out in the yard, digging in the weeds yesterday. I have weeded all of the flower beds and ready to start round two. I worked so hard yesterday that I have earned myself a new trowel. I bent the old up something terrible. I still have a little bit of planting to do today. I have two pots of begonias to do for my front porch, a few marigolds to put in the pot on the deck, and my herbs to put in the boxes hanging from my deck. The next thing will be mulch.

In stitches,
Judy

The Green One is my Favorite

I made three dresses for Elly and I told my son on the phone the green one is my favorite and this is the picture I got on Tuesday. And I have been reminded that I do that thing with my feet that she is doing.

In stitches,
Judy

It's addictive!!

I have been working on making hexies the last two days and it is addictive. I have cut close to 100 white hexies  and I can glue paste at least while I am waiting for my callers to gather the information I need for their prior authorization. My pile of hexies are growing!! I will soon be adding them to my top. I am so excited.

I like to add a picture to my blog and I do not have a picture of the hexies in the bag up at the sewing machine, but I do have a picture of the quilt I have on my front door. I used to have a basket of ivy that I added flowers or stars as the seasons changed.

In stitches,
Judy

Down Time

 I work in a call center and sometimes I have a bit of down time. So I like to have something to work on. Lately I have been crocheting dish cloths. I have made and given away quite a bunch of them. In fact, if you see me on the street, watch out I might offer you a dish cloth.

Several years ago I made this quilt during my down time at work. It is hand pieced. I would mark the 1/4" seam allowance and away I would go. It is not yet quilted because it will be hand quilted.

So I have prepped all morning for my new down time project. Hexies!! I have cut a good stack of white hexies and today I will start glue basting them. I have finished one so far and I have already learned the glue dries quickly and I had to reapply it times to get around the hexagon. This is such a learning process.

I also spent an hour snipping on Neil's rag quilt. Not much to show for that. But I am trying to do about an hour every day and hope to get it washed and dried this weekend.

In stitches,
Judy

Hexies

This will make my sister, Karen, happy. I have yet again drug out my Grandmother's Flower Garden. It was started more years ago than I can remember. I have been reading lots of blogs about hexies and decided this needed see the light of day and perhaps become a finished project for 2013.

I have finally figured out what needs to be done in order for me to complete it. I used to add pieces to this quilt in a circular manner. Not a good idea, it now misshapen. Also this was started when I was a novice quilter. I noticed there are a few pieces in the quilt top that are not 100% cotton. I am not taking them out but I am not adding any more of them to the quilt top. Also my color palette has definitely changed over the years. I really like bright colors and 30's prints. Not many of them in this quilt. But I still have some similar prints in my stash that will work if I need to make more flowers.

I did find a nice stack of flowers and an equally nice stack of hexies that need to be paper lined. I have here to order pre cut hexie shapes for the paper lining. And I have a new template to use when I cut the white fabric. And the class I took with Darlene Zimmerman, here has given the courage to finish the edge of the quilt.

I need to upstairs and get busy. The last few hours of my weekend is fading fast and I think I am going to put in some overtime tonight.

In stitches,
Judy

Design Wall Monday

I cannot remember the last time I posted something to Patchwork Times for Design Wall Monday. I am trying to stay more focused on quilting and this is the project that I am working on right now.

This is the quilt I am making for my nephew, Neil here, who is having his 2nd birthday later this month. It is now in need of snipping, snipping, and more snipping before it gets a bath and a fluff!!

In stitches,
Judy